An inertial navigation system (INS) is a navigation aid that uses one or more inertial measurement units (IMUs) with sensors such as accelerometers and gyroscopes to continuously calculate position, velocity, and angular orientation of a moving object. An INS may be used on vehicles such as land vehicles, ships, aircraft, submarines, guided missiles, and spacecraft. The fidelity of the sensor measurements from the IMU is important to the overall navigation performance, and sensor faults or inaccurate sensor measurement models may cause a loss in navigation performance. Aiding sensors, such as global navigation satellite system (GNSS) sensors, have been used to correct navigation errors due to accelerometer bias and gyroscope bias, but the conventional approaches may not be satisfactory to correct navigation errors, particularly with respect to issues such as accelerometer and gyroscope measurement faults or accelerometer and gyroscope measurement model errors.
Accordingly, it is desirable to provide more accurate and robust INSs in the presence of IMU sensor measurement faults and IMU measurement model errors. Furthermore, other desirable features and characteristics of the present invention will become apparent from the subsequent detailed description of the invention and the appended claims, taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings and this background of the invention.